I would like to say 2 things:
1/ to our fundamentalist: still an American flag on the moon!
2/ about the movie: freedom don't allow you to be antisemitic .

1) Then they should leave the medieval age and join the 21st century and put one of their own on the moon
2) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYkbqzWVHZI <-- this never caused a riot, or murder spree, or even mildly branded as antisemitic. It's satire, and you don't have a right to be not offended anyway._________________

juniper wrote:

you experience political reality dilation when travelling at american political speeds. it's in einstein's formulas. it's not their fault.

I find it especially alarming that they're not going for the producer, but just went into berzerk mode and attack Amercian and other "western" installations. Yes, it was an American (more or less) who made the film, that does not mean all Amercans share this view (as far as I know, some Americans are Muslims, even).

As for the free speech != insulting Mohammed: Those same people who just got rid of an oppressive government (only to vote - in free elections, hooray - for a religious government that's probably not much better) want other governments to abandon free speech. How ironic.

I would find it especially alarming if they did go after the producer.

They shouldn't be "going after" anyone.

For a group which prides themselves on preserving the wisdom of ancient Greece, they sure seem unable to appreciate what they saved.

This may require a "civilizing war."

They didn't go after the producer because the film was just peripheral to their main objective: to launch a coordinated attack on the U.S. presence in the Middle East on 9/11. They might even believe that doing so just before an election will influence U.S. policy. The movie was just used to agitate the masses, which gave them human shields and created the illusion of some degree of legitimacy to the attacks as an act of protest. It even worked, to a degree: the immediate response of the Obama administration was not to stand up for freedom of expression but to apologize, say "it's not my fault", and condemn the free speech. Those statements legitimized the attacks in the eyes of the world and the perpetrators, as does the theater of having the producer of the film effectively "arrested" by police in front of lots of press cameras.

They didn't go after the producer because the film was just peripheral to their main objective: to launch a coordinated attack on the U.S. presence in the Middle East on 9/11. They might even believe that doing so just before an election will influence U.S. policy. The movie was just used to agitate the masses, which gave them human shields and created the illusion of some degree of legitimacy to the attacks as an act of protest. It even worked, to a degree: the immediate response of the Obama administration was not to stand up for freedom of expression but to apologize, say "it's not my fault", and condemn the free speech. Those statements legitimized the attacks in the eyes of the world and the perpetrators, as does the theater of having the producer of the film effectively "arrested" by police in front of lots of press cameras.

Part of me wishes that was true, which would mean that there is some hope and sense left, but a large part of me thinks that the reality is much more sinister then that._________________“If You Meet the Buddha on the Road, Kill Him”

I am actually surprised at the timid response of the US govt. Maybe its right not to be belligerent about this, but a US ambassador got killed. that isn't tiny news. that is super serious. you can't have ambassadors being killed (not just from the US but from any country). I am not advocating any violence on the part of the americans (who are being remarkably admirable), but some words telling these countries to get their act together and protect the US embassies may be in order. The embassies need protection or need to be evacuated, as it seems the staff is in serious danger.

I am actually surprised at the timid response of the US govt. Maybe its right not to be belligerent about this, but a US ambassador got killed. that isn't tiny news. that is super serious. you can't have ambassadors being killed (not just from the US but from any country). I am not advocating any violence on the part of the americans (who are being remarkably admirable), but some words telling these countries to get their act together and protect the US embassies may be in order. The embassies need protection or need to be evacuated, as it seems the staff is in serious danger.

I dunno.

Nothing admirable about it...the Americans just don't want to start a war before the election.

There are thousands of videos; thousands of Internet sites that "insult" Islam and the Prophet. Anyone that believes that this one film is the cause of the current barbaric behavior by those followers of Islam need their cognitive functions readjusted._________________The further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those who speak it.
George Orwell

I would like to say 2 things:
1/ to our fundamentalist: still an American flag on the moon!
2/ about the movie: freedom don't allow you to be antisemitic .

1) Then they should leave the medieval age and join the 21st century and put one of their own on the moon
2) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYkbqzWVHZI <-- this never caused a riot, or murder spree, or even mildly branded as antisemitic. It's satire, and you don't have a right to be not offended anyway.

There are thousands of videos; thousands of Internet sites that "insult" Islam and the Prophet. Anyone that believes that this one film is the cause of the current barbaric behavior by those followers of Islam need their cognitive functions readjusted.

I am actually surprised at the timid response of the US govt. Maybe its right not to be belligerent about this, but a US ambassador got killed. that isn't tiny news. that is super serious. you can't have ambassadors being killed (not just from the US but from any country). I am not advocating any violence on the part of the americans (who are being remarkably admirable), but some words telling these countries to get their act together and protect the US embassies may be in order. The embassies need protection or need to be evacuated, as it seems the staff is in serious danger.

I dunno.

Nothing admirable about it...the Americans just don't want to start a war before the election.

No, if we wanted war, or oil, we can do that in the western hemisphere.
Canada, Mexico, and Vuvuzela would be absorbed into the collective greed state.

What Americans want is to be safe and be left alone.
That requires an absence of fanatics waging asymmetric warfare against us.

Yes. And while thus occupied, they are not hijacking and flying our planes into our buildings, sinking, hijacking, or blockading our ships, taking hostages, intentionally killing innocent civilians by the thousands, and training armies of fanatics to attack us.*

* Except in the Maghreb, where Obama actually gave them weapons, trained them in combined arms tactics and indirect fires, and removed the biggest local threat to them, and then left our embassy undefended except by locals.

...you're impoverishing yourselves, while providing the Jihadis with a propaganda goldmine, and disenfranchising millions of young and pliable Muslim men and so driving their recruitment numbers through the roof.

Well done._________________

juniper wrote:

you experience political reality dilation when travelling at american political speeds. it's in einstein's formulas. it's not their fault.

It's not like millions in middle-east have something rational and safe to fall back to, like I dunno, take up carpentry or web design lessons once they grow out of their religious phase. No need to bomb them and make things worse._________________“If You Meet the Buddha on the Road, Kill Him”

I agree. I think we should leave the problem of Islam to Europe, Russia, and China. It's not our problem. If they attack us, we destroy whoever attacked; but no more nation-building. Provided we control it domestically, the Jihadi resurgence of Islamist imperialism is your problem, not ours.

It probably won't come to a head for 50 years or so, but maybe after you've beaten each other to nearly to death, we'll come over and finish them off for you and deliver the coup de grâce , like we did in the other world wars.

We should be devoting our resources to the annexation of Canada, Cuba, and Central America.

I agree. I think we should leave the problem of Islam to Europe, Russia, and China. It's not our problem. If they attack us, we destroy whoever attacked; but no more nation-building. Provided we control it domestically, the Jihadi resurgence of Islamist imperialism is your problem, not ours.

It probably won't come to a head for 50 years or so, but maybe after you've beaten each other to nearly to death, we'll come over and finish them off for you and deliver the coup de grâce , like we did in the other world wars.

We should be devoting our resources to the annexation of Canada, Cuba, and Central America.

Cmon, stop being so pouty...

You know damn well that what you are doing in Middle-East is not "taking care of it" or "spreading democracy" or "educating masses" or "accelerating islam towards its own Enlightenment". You are there for their oil. No need to be shy about it. All empires behaved the same way, we've seen it before. Pardon us for not giving a shit weather you guys think history started with Declaration of Independence.

Also, all those wars create refugees, which end up in Europe, maybe because its kinda close, and it had social system designed to not allow its own population (you know, those Europeans who built it up) to slide down to poverty, crime, etc etc, in case they get fired from a job, or lose a leg in a car accident and stuff. You know, stuff that happens to people.

All you ever did in Middle-East was try to get oil, play proxy wars with Soviet Union, remove democratically elected presidents with your UK buddies and install tyrannical assholes, who in turn got booted in a revolution and replaced with a fucked up ogres from Stone age, who accidentaly point their fingers at you guys (wonder why).

And now all of a sudden you are saving us from Islamisation? Color me unimpressed, you're just doing same shit colonial powers were doing before you, don't try and pretend you're doing something else. Hubris = BAD._________________“If You Meet the Buddha on the Road, Kill Him”

And now all of a sudden you are saving us from Islamisation? Color me unimpressed, you're just doing same shit colonial powers were doing before you, don't try and pretend you're doing something else. Hubris = BAD.

You read some second-level interpretation into what I said, or something. I'm not justifying it; I'm saying we should not be doing it.

But, if you think our only interest there is oil, you're only seeing a tiny piece of the picture. You think we're in Afghanistan over oil? I think maybe you need to give it some more thought.

Also, don't worry, when they come up through the Balkans this time, just use the lessons learned from last time about what works: impale every enemy prisoner and collaborator, and leave a forest of impaled Muslim bodies as a warning to the invaders. Maybe they won't make it all the way into the heart of central Europe this time, or capture Spain, Greece, etc.